


When One Door Closes...

by starstruck1986



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-30
Updated: 2013-03-30
Packaged: 2017-12-06 23:34:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/741485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starstruck1986/pseuds/starstruck1986
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Warnings: Fluff, mentions of rimming, angst.<br/>Summary: Nobody wants to be sloppy seconds, and nobody wants another man's waste, but Harry just can't hold it in any more.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When One Door Closes...

“I know you don't have any sympathy for me,” Ron said darkly, as he cradled his head over a cup of tea and the bacon sandwich that Harry had made for him.  
  
“What're you on about now?” Harry muttered, slamming the kettle back onto the worktop. “I made you breakfast, didn't I? Would I have done that if I had no sympathy?”  
“Yeah, because I might have burnt the kitchen down otherwise.”  
“I don't give a fuck about the kitchen!” Harry burst out, and Ron sat up and looked at him in surprise. “Sorry, too loud?”  
“A bit...” Ron winced.  
  
Harry sighed and sat down opposite him at their tiny kitchen table, in their tiny kitchen. Ron braved a sip of tea and found it made him feel better, freshening his mouth and warming his insides.  
  
“I haven't told you the worst of it yet,” he mumbled finally, wiping his lips. He looked into the amber liquid, trying to decide how to break the news   
“What's Malfoy done now?” Harry asked sagely.  
“Ended it,” Ron blurted, feeling his throat thicken.  
  
They had never had the most stable of relationships, with blazing arguments and Draco insisting that he was better than everyone, especially Ron, and more than once Ron had been accused by his friends and family of following blindly like a puppy longing to be loved.  
  
Even though he had thrown a strop each time, Ron had always privately acknowledged that their description wasn't far off the mark.  
  
“What?” Harry breathed, scooting his chair further beneath the table and frowning.  
“You heard... don't make me say it again, Harry. Contrary to what you think, I have feelings. And they're sort of ripped to shreds at the minute, so...”  
“I never said you didn't have feelings,” Harry said quietly.  
  
Ron looked glumly up at him and shrugged.  
  
“What happened?”  
“Nothing much... you know what last night was?”  
  
Harry took a moment to scan through his mental calendar and then shook his head.  
  
“One year anniversary. He made this big thing of it, said we had to go out for dinner and mark the occasion... made me get dressed up to the bloody nines and we went to that restaurant off the Alley, Merlin's?”  
“Fuck, the place where you need enough galleons to bribe the management to give you a table?” Harry asked, looking oddly impressed.  
“That's the one. It was amazing. Cheesecake was fucking delicious. Anyway...” Ron paused, sipping at his tea to fortify himself. “At the end of the food, he picks my hand up off the table... first clue, really, he never touches me in public.”  
“In case he gets gay bashed,” Harry supplied with an angry look. Ron shrugged.  
“He told me that he didn't think we were working, and that he thought dinner might soften that blow as I'm always a bit calmer after a good meal.”  
“Fucking dickhead,” Harry spat. “I'll have him-”  
“There's more.”  
  
Ron closed his eyes.  
  
“He said there was someone else. Someone at work, apparently. Older man.”  
“For how long?”  
“Recent development,” Ron said. “Or I hope it was. But I can't compete with someone twice my age with, it seems, quite a lot more money than I have.”  
  
Harry's long exhale was the politest way he could put across his annoyance, it seemed. Ron couldn't meet his eyes, afraid that his own would spill over with the tears which had been threatening since they had parted at the restaurant. He heard the scrape of chair legs on the kitchen tiles and then, unexpectedly, there was a warm arm wrapping around him from behind. Harry pulled him backwards so that he was against his chest and Ron didn't know what to say. He settled on remaining quiet and letting Harry continue to be odd.  
  
“I'm really sorry, Ron. I know how you felt about him.”  
  
Ron thought bitterly back to the drunken weekend where he had blurted his true feelings about the Malfoy heir to his best friend -that he loved him, no matter how dysfunctional their relationship was.  
  
“It couldn't last forever. Nothing ever does, right?” Ron asked numbly, clutching at straws.  
“Eat your breakfast.” Harry avoided the question. “And then go back to bed. It's Saturday.”  
“We're due at Mum's,” Ron said miserably; his family were the last people he wanted to see.  
“Well I'll firecall and say that you've come down with a headache and I've been put on call for work. She won't mind.”  
“This is my mother we're talking about.”  
“And I know just how to handle her.” Harry laughed, and then Ron heard him leave the kitchen.  
  
***  
“What's wrong with him, then?”  
  
Ron heard the disbelieving voice of his older brother outside of his bedroom door and pulled the duvet even higher, over his chin.  
  
“Headache.”  
“Was he out on the piss last night?” Charlie asked, his tone a laugh. “Because Mum won't have that... self-inflicted. She wants us all together to talk about what we're going to get George for his birthday. She wants it to be a nice one as this is the first year he really knows which way is up.”  
“Well, Ron doesn't know which way is up at the minute, so leave him. Please?”  
“What's going on?”  
  
Ron had never realised quite how thin the walls of their flat were. He screwed up his face up remembering every time that both he and Draco had cried out with sexual pleasure when Harry was only feet away, probably hearing every longing moan and every sultry beg.  
  
“Malfoy ended things with him last night. On their anniversary. At dinner.”  
“Did he mean it?” Charlie asked, his voice lowering.  
“Think so. Ron's bed in bed crying all morning and a box of stuff came through the Floo about half an hour ago.”  
“What a prick,” Charlie exclaimed. “Didn't even let the sheets cool off before he got rid of everything.”  
“There's somebody else involved, I don't know who. Ron's really cut up.”  
“One hell of a headache,” Charlie agreed. “Alright. I'll fob Mum off and leave you two alone then.”  
“Thanks, Charlie. He won't really talk to me, so you lot'll just mess up his head.”  
“Harry...”  
  
Ron strained his ears to hear as the voices outside his door lowered even further.  
  
“Harry... don't you think that maybe now is the time?”  
“I can't do that. Don't want to be his sloppy seconds.”  
  
Heart beginning to thud, Ron sat up.  
  
“You've wanted him for a long time... And now you can properly-”  
“No,” Harry said flatly. “It's not right to do that.”  
“No, you're right...” Charlie said quickly. “What on earth would be right about two people who've known each other forever, who care about each other and already live together, starting a relationship which we all know would work and last until the first one of you dies?”  
  
“What the fuck?” Ron muttered beneath his breath.  
  
“All I'm saying...” Charlie's voice faded as he walked away. Ron heard the creak of the floorboards. “Is that you might be the one to knit his ripped soul back together.”  
“Shut up.”  
  
After that, Ron heard no more. He assumed that Charlie and Harry had moved back into the living room, and their conversation was as private as they had assumed it had been in the first place. Falling back on his pillows with a grunt, Ron blinked at the ceiling.  
  
 _He can't._  
  
His mind had been working sluggishly all morning, but at that point it threatened to give out all together. Ron just couldn't make sense of what his brother had been saying.  
  
 _Maybe he's been smoking weed again. Gin for breakfast. He's done it before..._  
  
Even as he had tried to convince himself, Ron still acknowledged the fact that Harry had sounded defeated as he had rejected Charlie's suggestions.  
  
 _Harry can't want me. Why hasn't he said before?_  
  
With that question still swimming in his head, Ron pulled the duvet up over his head and willed sleep to come to him.  
  
***  
“You're quiet,” Ron said finally, setting down his fork on his mostly full plate. His appetite seemed to have vanished with his boyfriend.  
“So are you,” Harry countered.  
“Yeah but I have a reason to be. Just because I'm miserable doesn't mean that you have to stay quiet. Is something up?”  
  
Harry muttered something indistinct and Ron didn't push him to repeat it. They had spent a week of mostly quiet dinners during which Ron ate very little and Harry ate far too much, finishing Ron's plate as well as his own, and then they sat quietly in front of the wireless together listening to Quidditch or separated to their rooms, to be lonely on their own.  
  
Ron couldn't quite believe just how much he missed Draco and his snotty little sayings, or the way he would always look Ron up and down to check what he was wearing before they went out in public. It was an odd sense of freedom that Ron didn't particularly like. In fact, he hated it. He was aching all over from clenching himself tightly to keep it all in. He'd taken a few days off work at the start of the week but his own sense of self-preservation had forced him back in on the Wednesday -simply because he couldn't lie in bed a moment longer.  
  
“Something's up.” Harry nodded and put his fork down. Ron watched as he pushed his plate away and took a deep swig of pumpkin juice. “And everyone's telling me I should do something about it, but I can't.”  
“Why not?” Ron frowned. “If something's wrong you should sort it out, Harry.”  
“That's the thing... I'd love to. I've wanted to sort it out for ages, but there's someone else involved in this thing and he's not so good at the minute.”  
“Is he a friend?” Ron asked.  
  
Harry didn't answer, put got up and put his plate in the sink. “Are you finished?”  
“Yeah. Sorry again... can't finish it.”  
  
Harry said nothing as he picked up the last of Ron's food and, instead of shovelling it into his own mouth as had become the norm, he rummaged in one of the cupboards for a plastic box to stow the food in as leftovers.  
  
“Look. Is this about me?” Ron said finally, his tired mind forcing him to be blunt. “Is there something I should know, but you don't want to tell me because you don't think I can handle it? Are you moving out?”  
“No!” Harry exclaimed, almost horrified by the suggestion. “No, I can't move out.”  
“You can if you want,” Ron said morosely. “I can pay the rent by myself.”  
“I'm not going any where!”  
“Alright,” Ron huffed. “No need to get shirty. Why don't you just tell me what's going on then?”  
  
Harry paused for a good while and Ron looked down at the table for something to do. He was on his usual side, the side that he automatically took, whilst Harry instantly took the other. There had never been an argument over seating in their house. Ron took the same end of the sofa, too, and Harry his.  
  
“Ron?”  
  
His spoken name was low in tone and much nearer than Ron had expected. He looked up to see Harry anxiously hovering next to him, top teeth biting into his bottom lip.  
  
“What?” he asked, tilting his head back.  
“This.”  
  
Harry leant forward and Ron thought that he was going to whisper something in his ear; open to such privacy, he tilted his head away so that his friend had better access. When a soft kiss brushed his cheek instead of whispered words caressing his ear, however, Ron jumped. He leapt to his feet and sent Harry lurching backward, unable to stop his fingertips from touching the skin of his cheek which had been kissed.  
  
“Harry?”  
“I'm sorry.”  
“Don't be.” Ron shook his head. “Don't. So... that's what you and Charlie were talking about outside my room last weekend?”  
“You heard that?” Harry visibly cringed.  
“I didn't mean to. It... I didn't know what to make of it and... you've been so quiet all week. No way was I mentioning it.”  
“Well... you already know, then, what I needed to say. That makes it a bit easier.”  
“No. I haven't heard it from your lips. All I heard from you was that you wouldn't be my sloppy seconds.”  
  
Ron looked embarrassedly down at his feet.  
  
“I won't,” Harry said softly. “Now isn't the right time for this. You're getting over a relationship.”  
“And normally, Harry... I'd be right behind you. But this is... this is me and you, isn't it? When have we ever done what we should? When we should? We just don't do that.”  
“You're hurt.” Harry shrugged and turned his back on Ron, turning on the tap to wash their plates.  
“And so are you, by the look of it. How long has this been going on behind my back?”  
“What?”  
“You wanting me?” Ron asked, unsure of where the anger within him was coming from. “Why am I the last to know everything? I try so fucking hard to be observant but it's done me no good over the last couple of years, has it? Fell in love with a man who promised he'd changed, that he felt for me too, and then got dumped, and somehow missed the fact that you were here every night I was out with him. I didn't even know you liked blokes!”  
“I pinched your porn when you were out with him. I always put it back, though.” There was a slight laugh in Harry's tone; a bitter laugh, full of regret.  
  
“Why didn't you just tell me when you first felt it?”  
“It was just after I finished with Ginny. It took you and Hermione a year longer to fall apart and I wasn't going to break you up.”  
  
“Fucking hell,” Ron muttered. He reached up and dragged his fingers through his hair.  
  
The kitchen was all of a sudden stifling and the walls felt as though they were closing in. Knowing he needed fresh air, Ron turned on his heel and headed for the front door of the flat, despite the fact that he was wrapped only in his old tatty dressing gown and his boxers. He jogged down the stairs to the ground floor, bare feet frozen by the cold steps. He heard his name questioningly called from above and ignored it. He fiddled with the key in the back door and managed to unlock it. Cool air greeted him and he sucked it into his lungs, grateful for the escape. He stepped onto the grass, enjoying the way his toes sank into it. He looked up at the cloudless sky and high, round moon. As it always did, the full shape reminded him of his old Professor, the kind man who had lost his life far too prematurely during the war. Ron did what he usually did -he closed his eyes and hoped, probably against hope, that wherever Remus Lupin was, he was at peace.  
  
“Thinking about Remus?” Harry's voice asked from behind him.  
“You know I am,” Ron answered quietly.   
  
A quick glance told him that their downstairs neighbours were out. The ground floor was drenched in darkness apart from the communal stairway. They were alone.  
  
“Harry... c'mere...” Ron turned and held out his arms. Harry stayed put. “Please?”  
“I told you, I won't be-”  
“I don't want you to be either,” Ron said earnestly. “I want you to be happy.”  
  
Harry's thin body stepped into his embrace. “Do you think I can be happy with you, Ron? When you're clearly still in love with Malfoy?”  
“Malfoy didn't stay.”  
“But you love him.”  
“And you don't think I love you?”  
“Not in the way that I need you to love me.”  
“You need me?” Ron asked weakly.  
“Why do you think I'm still living with you, torturing myself every day at the sight of you half-undressed and seeing that fucking cute face you do when you're tired and you really need your bed.”  
“Because you've never been good about doing what's right for you?” Ron tried.  
“Because I need you and because I bloody love you, you idiot,” Harry breathed.   
  
Nothingness stretched between them and Ron didn't know what to do. Harry was stiff in his arms and his ankles had gone numb from the breeze around them. He shifted his weight to the other hip and looked Harry in the eye.  
  
“You started this. You said it. So what do you want now, Harry? Why did you tell me if you didn't want to act on how you feel?”  
“Because I couldn't keep it in any more... seeing you so rough this week. It hurts me, when you're like that.”  
“Okay, I'm going to shut you up now,” Ron muttered. “Because I can't take any more of your lines from the Witch Weekly romance stories.”  
  
Harry's indignant protest was muffled as Ron brought their lips together. The man in his arms tasted of tea and the lasagne they had just eaten for dinner. He soon fell silent as Ron moved to deepen the kiss, flicking his tongue along the crease of soft lips. A low moan was his reward as their tongues met.  
  
“Mummy! There are two boys kissing in the garden!”  
  
The tell-tale shriek of the five-year-old boy who was part of the family living below forced them apart.  
  
“Oh... it's just upstairs...” the child sounded almost disappointed that there was nothing more exciting to the two figures in his garden. At that moment, all the lights in the downstairs flat flickered into life.  
“Ha! I told you they were gay, Gavin!” a female voice sounded.  
“You did. You've just told them that you think they're gay too,” a sarcastic voice replied.  
“Well if they're kissing in the garden then that's no secret-”  
  
Ron couldn't help it; he began to laugh, and great silent giggles ripped through his torso, shaking him to his core. When he glanced at Harry he found him in a similar state, though he had one hand clamped over his mouth to better hold in his mirth.  
  
He snatched Harry's hand from mid-air and tugged him back towards the doorway. He hurried up the stairs, well aware of his bare legs and hairy chest poking out from the neck of his gown, and pulled Harry with him until they had shut the door of the flat behind them. They both began to laugh.  
  
Ron wrapped his arms around Harry's neck and kissed him again. “God, I needed that.”  
“The kiss or the laugh?” Harry enquired.  
“Both. Both helped.”  
“Helped what?”  
“My soul,” Ron whispered dramatically. “Tell Charlie you're already healing it, won't you?”  
“Once won't be enough,” Harry pointed out. “You'll need intensive care and a lot of love... though I'm not doing that thing that you and Draco used to do that made you make that squeaking noise.”  
  
Ron blushed and looked sheepishly away.  
  
“What _was_ he doing to you?” Harry murmured into Ron's ear.  
“Well, he had his tongue somewhere not very... nice. For him, I mean,” Ron grinned dirtily. “It made me come all over my bedsheets.”  
  
Harry shuddered in his arms.  
  
“Maybe I will then.”  
“So... you're... gonna... try not to be my sloppy seconds, eh?”  
“Well, we can't disappoint downstairs, can we?” Harry's eyebrows rose. “And I can't pretend any more.”  
“Good.” Ron kissed him again. “Good. Thank you. I love you.”  
  
  
 _-Fin-_


End file.
